Bladeless Bunny
by ExtraSyrupPlease
Summary: A reimagining of the Blade Bunny prologue. Bethany goes to a new school and struggles to form meaningful relationships to replace those she's lost. Then other stuff happens, unless it doesn't.


Author's notes:

I've stuck loosely to the original plot so far because this is a "fix fic"; I'm unsure how faithful subsequent chapters will be, should there ever be any. YMMV on whether my version is actually "better".

The "Little Red Riding Hood" assignment is closely based on an assignment from my ninth grade English class.

The teacher does not seem to have a name in canon, thus "Mr. Twinkletoes" is arbitrary.

* * *

The other sixth graders chatted excitedly on their way to class, but Bethany was silent, alone, not part of any of the little cliques surrounding her in the hallway. She and her family had recently moved here — well, most of her family. Her parents had just come off a lengthy divorce; her mother had kept the house, and her father the kids. Dad didn't want the house and Mom didn't want the kids, so that part at least was amicable.

Everything seemed to be blue, gray or brown here, and the blue fluorescent lights gave the place a cold, clinical air. Bethany missed her colorful old school with the lemon-yellow walls, pink and orange classroom doors, and bright green chairs. More than that, however, she missed her friends and the school projects she'd never get to finish. Now she was being dropped into a strange new place, like walking into the darkness where everything is unknown and the dreadful possibilities are endless, and she'd have to catch up to a class in full swing and it wouldn't be as much fun because there was hardly enough time.

Already she was painfully aware of not fitting in. She was wearing a pink polka-dotted dress and the other children all had on shirts and something else — usually skirts or pants. Some of them had slogans, like "Jesus Died for You" and "Coke Pepsi". Some of them had stripes. None of them had polka-dots. She'd noticed a few kids pretending not to laugh at her, and one person had said "the 1950s called, they want your dress back". She hadn't responded, but it hurt that someone who didn't even know her took the time to disparage her like that. She hoped the others would be more accepting.

It was a challenge to weave her way through the swarms of students here; her old school was more navigable. When she got to class most of them were already sitting down, talking amongst themselves, oblivious to her presence. She claimed a seat near the front of the room, next to a girl who wore a magenta sweatshirt and whose brown hair was divided into bangs and sideburns in the front and a high ponytail in the back. Bethany tried to strike up a conversation with the girl, but she was absorbed in her cell phone.

The teacher arrived shortly before the bell rang. He looked surprisingly young; there was no hint of gray in his hair or wrinkles on his face. His clothes shared the school's drab color scheme except for his tiger-striped tie. He was wearing those fancy newfangled glasses where there aren't any frames around the lenses so it looks like you're not wearing them, at least in theory.

After requesting that everyone sit down, stop talking and put their phones away, he asked Bethany to stand up so that everyone could say hi to the new student. The response was halfhearted, even when he told them to be more enthusiastic. Bethany was embarrassed: being the center of attention was not one of her talents. She hoped he wouldn't ask her to give some kind of speech about herself. He didn't. She sat back down.

When all that was over with, he handed out stacks of stapled documents that were to be passed down the columns. They contained a version of Little Red Riding Hood, which he said was the reading assignment that they were starting today. Bethany had already read this story. She raised her hand and said as much.

"There are multiple versions of it, so you probably read a different one," said the teacher, whose name was Mr. Twinkletoes. "This is the modern simplified version."

"The _simplified_ version? Isn't it simple enough already?"

"It's actually quite complex and is difficult for some people to understand. Anyway, class, please read this, and if you don't finish it in class you can do so at home."

Mr. Twinkletoes had informed the students that they were not to read out loud, but one or two of them did anyway and had to be told to stop. He also had to tell them to stop talking and get off their phones several times. Bethany normally didn't care for such distractions, but good heavens was the reading assignment boring. There hadn't been much to it on the first go-round, and now it had even less plot than Twilight. She'd picked up one of her sister's Twilight books once, thinking she was about to read something exciting and dramatic, but she hadn't been able to get past the first chapter.

She wished the assignment had been something else, like something from the Narnia series. On the other hand, she'd already read parts of that, too.

Nonetheless, she finished the watered-down Little Red Riding Hood with almost half the class left over, well before anyone else. She asked Mr. Twinkletoes what she should do now, and he hesitated briefly before handing her a sheet of math problems. In her peripheral vision she saw the brown-haired girl, whose name she now knew was Sherri, look up briefly and flash her a glare. It was the first time she'd even acknowledged Bethany.

The math problems were simple enough, just fractions, division and multiplication. She finished them in ten minutes and sat in silence until class was over. Then she ran, only stopping when the crowd became too thick.


End file.
